Phillips 66PSXDON'T BUYNov 28, 2013Stock price when the opinion was issued
As of Jun 10, 2026. Market Open.
Warren Buffett has been picking away at this. It is very difficult to build a refinery. There is a limited number of competitors, so they are well situated. The drawback is that you are beholden to crack spreads, basically the value of all the different components of a barrel of oil after it has been refined. In the past couple of years, it has been a very, very good business, but it is a cyclical business. The ways the composition of crude oil is coming to refineries is changing. He would prefer going to where the greatest value is, which is going to be the crude producers.
Once again, differentials have widened. There’s been a turnaround in the refineries in the Gulf Coast, so they shut down, which causes a lot of oil to show up in inventories. A good time to play refineries on the East Coast because they can buy very discounted crude from the Bakken and make a really big profit. This is a very volatile stock and not to be owned for the long run. Over the next 12 months differentials will probably narrow because of 2 pipelines that are going to come on in the next 12 months and bring oil down to the Gulf Coast. Be careful.